Contents

Introduction

Within its mandate to promote the development, conservation, rational management and best utilization of living marine resources, the General Fisheries Commission for the Mediterranean (GFCM) has, since its foundation, taken into due consideration the legal issues surrounding the sustainable use of fishery resources. In particular, many GFCM decisions regard the development and establishment by its Contracting Parties of the appropriate legal framework for defining access to the fisheries resources, implementing conservation and management measures, or conducting monitoring, control and surveillance operations. Several projects and studies were also launched over the last years to compile the fisheries-related legislation with a view to identifying regulatory gaps or weaknesses and areas of potential legal harmonization.

In the same spirit, this GFCM Database on National Fisheries Legislation is aimed to provide fisheries managers and stakeholders with updated information on the principal measures adopted by GFCM Contracting Parties, Cooperating non Contracting Parties and relevant non Contracting Parties in the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. During the session of the thirty-ninth session of the GFCM, Milan, Italy, 25–29 May 2015, the Commission has granted the cooperating non-contracting party status to Georgia and Ukraine in light of their increasing involvement in GFCM activities in the Black Sea.

Fisheries legal frameworks are addressed with respect to three core issues, namely:

the access regimes to fisheries resources;

the conservation and management measures;

the requirements of the fishing vessels; and

the monitoring, control and surveillance operations (including some of the sanctions imposed for breaches).

It was also created a section on aquaculture legal framework that will be developed and update shortly.

The information provided is based inter alia on the answers provided by national experts within the “Questionnaire on fisheries legislation in the Mediterranean and the Black Sea” (here in "LaMed Questionnaire") drafted and circulated over the period 2010-2011. When possible, reference is made to the specific legal provision and the according legislative text. For some of them, no translation is yet available.

The GFCM Secretariat has updated recently the GFCM National Database with the information of the FAOLEX portal due to the ongoing cooperation with FAO Legal Office (LEGN). This Database and its contents are currently subject to revision and will be thus updated in due course.